XXVI 
INTRODUCTION. 
bones made by Mr. T. F. Cheeseman, from a cave at Pataua, near Whangarei, in the far North, and 
practically the same district from which the Rev. W. Cotton obtained the first bones of Dinorms 
curtus in 1844-45. In this collection there was an almost perfect skeleton of a species appreciably 
smaller than the last-named one ; and, under the name of Dinornis oweni, Haast dedicated this to 
“ the illustrious biologist to whom science in New Zealand is so much indebted ’ *. 
In a paper published in 1874, Sir Julius Haast proposed a new classification of the extinct 
Struthiones, which, so far, does not appear to have met with general acceptance. He divided them 
into two Families, which he named respectively the Dinornithidw and the Palapterygidce, each with 
two genera, the former comprising Dinornis and Meionornis, and the latter Palapteryx and Eury apteryx . 
He made the total absence of hind toe or hallux the distinguishing character of the first-named 
Family, thus following the broad line by which Owen had already differentiated his genera Dinornis 
and Palapteryx. He ventured, moreover, to characterize his Family PalapterygidcB as one in which 
the anterior limbs are entirely absent ; but his conclusions on this head are far from being decisive. 
It would appear more likely, from the analogy of the case, that in those species in which the wings 
are supposed to have been wholly absent they existed only in a very rudimentary form, and that the 
small bones have perished, leaving no trace behind for the modern student of palaeontology. It seems 
to be placed beyond doubt that in all the so-called W ingless Birds, by long-continued disuse of the 
anterior limbs through many successive generations, these organs had become enfeebled and ulti- 
mately atrophied and dwarfed to the condition of mere rudiments, as is now conspicuously apparent 
in the existing species of Apteryx. Professor Owen has suggested that in the case of Dinornis “ the 
degree of atrophy, which seems to have been carried to a total loss of the limb-appendages of the 
scapulo-coracoid arch, implies the operation of the influence of disuse through a period of pre-Maori 
eeons greatly exceeding the time during which the Lamarckian law has operated on the Cassowary, 
the Rhea, and the Ostrich.” 
Following this came the discovery by Sir James Hector of the remains of an extinct Goose, of 
very large if not gigantic proportions, and undoubtedly flightless. This proved to be the bird a few 
detached bones of which Professor Owen had previously referred to a genus “ hitherto unknown to 
science,” and supposed to be of the Struthious Order, for which he proposed the name of Cnemiornis 
calcitrans. The first tolerably complete skeleton of this Anserine form, which was certainly 
contemporaneous with the colossal Moas, was obtained by the Hon. Captain Fraser in the Earns- 
clough caves, and was afterwards presented by him to the British Museum. Another coeval species 
determined by Professor Huxley, was the giant Penguin ( Palceeudyptes antarcticus), of which the bones 
were discovered by Mantell in the Oamaru limestone in 1849. To the same species are doubtless 
referable the fossil remains more recently found by Mr. J ames Duigan at Hokitika. These were 
discovered imbedded in a reef exposed only at low water and forming part of the Seal Rock, a bold 
headland which protects the anchorage of Woodpecker Bay. The bones were thoroughly mineralized, 
resembling the condition in which fossil reptilian bones aie usually found f. 
Even now, although the Post-pliocene bone-deposits of New Zealand, both North and South, have 
been pretty thoroughly explored, new species of Wingless Birds are being from time to time added to 
the list. During the last seven years Professor Owen has characterized two new species from the 
* Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. xii. p. 171. 
t Trans. N.-Z. Instit. vol. iv. pp. 341-346. 
